Biologist Bradley joins Center

Robert Bradley brings expertise in understanding alternative splicing to Basic Sciences and Public Health Sciences divisions

Aug. 15, 2011

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By Colleen Steelquist

Dr. Robert Bradley studies alternative splicing, the process by which a single gene can give rise to multiple distinct proteins.

Photo by Bo Jungmayer

Dr. Robert Bradley joined the Hutchinson Center faculty this month, with a joint appointment in the Public Health Sciences Division’s Herbold Computational Biology Program and the Basic Sciences Division.

Bradley studies alternative splicing, the process by which a single gene can give rise to multiple distinct proteins. This mechanism, which affects the vast majority of human genes, enormously increases the complexity of our genome and plays important roles in many tumors and genetic diseases. Gaining a better understanding of this process is important, as disruption of normal splicing can give rise to cancer.

Bradley comes to the Center from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow. While at MIT, he was a Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation fellow. He also did postdoctoral work at the University of California, Berkeley after earning a doctoral degree in biophysics there.

Bradley said the Center’s combination of cutting-edge science and its open, congenial atmosphere make an ideal research environment.

"Robert is one of a new breed of biologists who use training in physics and mathematics to develop new ways of analyzing and interpreting the massive amounts of DNA sequence information that are now coming down the pipe," said Dr. Jonathan Cooper, Basic Sciences Division director. "Creative people like Robert find the needles in haystacks of data and discover new ways that genes are regulated."